Advertising and Marketing Campaigns are strong tools utilized by business to reach out to potential customers. Their message needs to strike a chord with the customers for their product to succeed. But in entering new markets like India, with huge language diversity, the message sometimes gets lost in translations. VMC Anuvaad LLP helps business mean their words in every language. The company transcreates, localizes, consults and provides other language services to businesses.
In the following interview with Insights Success, Founder Vikram Manghnani, divulges more about VMC Anuvaad.
- Kindly brief us about your company?
Localization and Transcreation. Cultural Consultation.
VMC Anuvaad LLP is a decade old transcreation and localization company based in Mumbai, India. We adapt global advertising and marketing campaigns into regional Indian languages. We cover the official 22 languages and almost every popularly spoken and native Indian language that resides in the Indian states like Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati, Tamil, Telegu, Kannada, etc. We have also ventured into Sinhalese (Sri Lanka), Bangla (Bangladesh) and Dzongkha (Bhutan). It is an extremely interesting line of work while working with the global content in a local way.
Typesetting Production , Voice Over Direction and Production.
We also undertake turnkey projects that include Typesetting Production, Voice over Direction and Production. From Talent Selection, Voice over Direction to the final Production, we provide end to end solutions with able studio and voice over facilities. This helps the client in getting a one-stop shop for their complete adaptation requirements.
Cultural Consultations
VMC Anuvaad provides in-market cultural consultations to international agencies on the relevance of the brand launch/ brand significance/brand response based upon certain parameters. These consultations are vital to the brand and they are researched upon by our team to provide true and factual data. We also provide live examples and video illustrations to the client to warrant the data provided. Some examples of consultations would be: a. to check brand name relevance in the local markets b. to study the cultural relevance of brand impact based on religion, region, race, language c. to understand the impact of certain behavioural patterns of the Indian customer based on parameters and a doctored habitat. These consultations are enriching and treated with utmost diligence from the agency’s end.
- About the CEO/ Founder and his responsibilities.
Vikram Manghnani is the co-founder of VMC Anuvaad. He entered this market at a nascent stage when transcreation as a word was unheard of. He was successfully running VMC, his principle advertising agency when he came across this opportunity. From there on, he built up this business and discovered the manifold potential.
Vikram and his business partner Lamiya now handle the business jointly. While Lamiya is involved in the Operations of the business, Vikram’s responsibilities are more directed towards business expansion, product development and in market talent tie-ups. It is also his core responsibility to train the talents as per the norms and standardization guidelines of international clients since transcreation and localization are highly confidential and data-driven markets.
- What kinds of language services does your company provide?
VMC Anuvaad provides end to end solutions for transcreation and localization requirements. Primarily, we do not translate, we transcreate. Literal translations from the English language may not always sound colloquial in the local markets. Hence there is a need to sound local and that is called transcreation. These services are provided across all media including, Above the Line, Below the Line, Digital and OOH, through our trusted and highly experienced in-market creative linguists who know how to capture nuances of their respective language besides adapting them from the source language.
Our additional production services include typesetting, voice over direction, voice over talent search, audio production and complete studio capabilities. Currently, we service agencies in India, UAE, Singapore, UK, Hong Kong, the US and China, in all Indian languages (print and audio).
- What are the biggest challenges or opportunities the company is facing/gaining at the moment?
Transcreation business is getting tougher as economies of developed countries are fluctuating. This means that the expenditures are more controlled now. Sometimes the clients are in a hurry to pass off the localization job as a mere translation job, hence the budgets are poor making it unfeasible for us to take up the project with expert and creative in – market talents who are not just language writers but copywriters. Usually, we realize that there is a vivid disconnect when it comes to explaining allotting proper budgets for adaptations because clients fail to understand the process and effort involved in adaptation.
The brighter side is that popular global brands are now venturing into India giving the localization business a greater edge. The brands need to speak to the consumer in their language, resonating the feeling that the local markets give. That evokes wonder, interest creates awareness and influences purchasing power amongst the local audiences at the grass root level in a language-centric country such as India. That is the reason, localization companies harness the power of effective transcreation and deliver communication in a dynamic environment.
Transcreation for regional languages is done at the lag end of the campaign cycle. Hence when it is adapted from English or Hindi into the respective language, it loses its substance at times. The thought process at this stage should be parallelly followed to help other languages be aligned with the same thought process. The end of food-chain treatment given to the regional languages/adaptations makes our process hasty and sometimes acts as a deterrent towards the creative output linguistically.
Opportunities and challenges are two sides of the same coin, while on one hand, we have budget constraints and fluctuating markets, on the other hand, we have valuable brands entering the desi plethora at a zooming pace. Digital communication is now neck to neck with print communication and now we are dealing with electronic media, online streaming video channels that are engaging with us to localize their content into different languages to reach out to a wider audience. Facing the challenge and seizing the opportunity is a part of every deft business strategy that VMC Anuvaad applies to its operations and expansion.
- What are the key ingredients that make your company a better option than others?
- Our in-market vanguard of proficient, expert and native language writers, verified language coaches, Sound studio capabilities, reliable typesetting facilities (for Indian languages), and trusted voice over artists who are there for us 24x7x365.
- A team who work across all time zones, mainly APAC, UAE, UK, EUROPE, AMERICAS and on holidays too!
- Our stringently developed process that insists on English Back Translation and Rationales from our writers.
- Providing end to end solutions under one umbrella.
- What are the future advancements of the company? How the company is prepared for it?
VMC Anuvaad has been the preferred transcreation partner for leading agencies and multinational conglomerates in India and abroad. Our clients include BBH (India), Ogilvy, Tag, World Writers, Mother Tongue, Hogarth, Wolfestone and many more. With satellite television and online streaming channels, regional content is gaining prominence at a fast pace and companies need to engage a wider audience. So the next step is preparing for longer tenure projects. We have already been approached by television channels for language adaptations for their regional users. Popular TV shows and channels are gaining a foothold in all regions and language is definitely not a barrier for them with capable partners such as VMC Anuvaad.
The next big wave is getting ready for the Digital industry. It has huge content but machine translations don’t really create a quality product. So, the next big task at hand would be to find, train copywriters who can adapt editorials, blogs, and other digital content while retaining the original meaning and infusing the local flavour, making the blog as enjoyable in other languages too, just as it is in the source language.
